Slashdot videos: Now with more Slashdot!

View

Discuss

Share

We've improved Slashdot's video section; now you can view our video interviews, product close-ups and site visits with all the usual Slashdot options to comment, share, etc. No more walled garden! It's a work in progress -- we hope you'll check it out (Learn more about the recent updates).

stephendavion (2872091) writes In Germany, high tech has come to airport parking. Last week, Düsseldorf airport (DUS) introduced robot valets to take the hassle out of parking for travelers. Travelers can leave their cars at the arrival level of the ParkingPLUS structure. As they leave, they confirm on a touch-screen that no one is in the car. The robot valet, nicknamed "Ray," takes it from there. The robot measures the vehicle, picks it up with a forklift-like system, and takes it to the back area, where it will position it in one of the 249 parking spots reserved for automated valets. The machine is capable of carrying standard cars weighing up to 3.31 tons.

really the whole "americans are fat" thing is mostly a product of misinformation at this point.

Um, no. The obesity here in the US is exceptional.

And really, I don't see why any country should be ashamed of a statistic like this... does it lead to higher incidents of heart disease? Sure... and? People chose bacon over low cholesterol... get over it.

Many supermarkets here supply their obese customers with scooter like shopping carts because they're to fat to walk.Levi's sells jeans with a 58" waist.We've become the laughing stock of the world.

Only to hipsters and eurofags. They bleat about tolerance and inclusion, except when it comes to people they disapprove of, and then suddenly they become snarky sarcastic little bitches with superiority complexes.

While Europe does have expanding waistlines and plenty of people get plump as they age, I cannot imagine an epidemic of morbid obesity like in the United States. Soft drinks and highly processed foods are more expensive here than in the United States, and in many countries there is sufficient momentum to get "fat taxes" passed on soft drinks and fast food.

And I don't think people would stand for it socially. I often go to the Deep South where I have family, and so many people are morbidly obese that no one

Yeah, that's no doubt what people thought here. I bet they thought that education would continue to be useful, too. Both things have the same root cause, government interference. They lied to us about what made you fat for decades, and they did it deliberately. At minimum, they did it to protect the processed foods industry. If you're really into conspiracy theories you might also consider that drugs to control cholesterol were just appearing on the market at that time.

Why does the government get the blame for not preventing the processed food industry,

Reading comprehension, you fail it. The government gets the blame for being the processed food industry's whore, and every other industry's as well — but that is outside the scope of this conversation.

It must have been that comment moaning about government interference that had me fooled.

Moaning? You wouldn't know moaning if it were up your ass kicking field goals. I was complaining about the specific nature of this government activity, not issuing a sermon against the concept of government. You should see a doctor about that knee. I think they can offer you some sort of treatment to help you stop jerking it.

I often go to the Deep South where I have family, and so many people are morbidly obese that no one bats an eye any more, and if you did confront people about their weight, they would say "Oh, uh, it must be a thyroid problem".

No one wants to take responsibility for the consequences of their actions, and obesity is one of those consequences.

Don't forget the advantages of traditions of healthier cuisine, and better regulation of food manufacturers.

And socialized healthcare. There's no reason to not go see a doctor, who will tell you how serious your obesity has, and get you help if you need it. That European doctors usually see the patients nude, probably also makes them more aware of who needs a pep talk before it becomes a real problem.

Are you by any chance British?In both Scandinavia and Germany, I've always been expected to strip down, at least to my undies, but bare when needed.

Here in the US, you generally have to put on a gown, so the lascivious doctors can't get a peek at your innocent and pure body. (In reality, so you can't sue them for doing so. And possibly so they can charge extra for the single-use gowns.)In tent sized gowns, there's no way the doctor can spot whether you're getting fatter and losing muscle mass, or have ski

statistically germans and english are about as fat... Some years, I think they've surpassed us.

I actually looked this up. For every year there are figures, the US obesity rate has been more than twice as high as Germany.As for the UK, they're up there too, but has never had a higher rate than the US.

Many of the pacific countries have an even higher percentage of obesity, but among OECD countries, the US ranks top.

I think I did an image search for "obesity country year", and then went into the web sites of the more interesting charts to find the sources.

Regular Google searches have become less useful these days, as advertisers and "famous sites" appear to be bumped towards the top even for the regular results. So I more often start with an image search to narrow it down to places that have information, not something to sell. Unfortunately, I think it's only a matter of time before Google catches on to this, and ske

A big part of the problem why Americans (and others) are fatter and fatter are because of misbeliefs foisted upon them.
Fatty foods don't cause heart disease. Sugar, stress, and smoking do. A high cholesterol count does not cause heart disease. It is a *symptom*, not a cause. It is your body attempting to repair the damage. Avoiding fats is a very good way to fatten yourself up. You'll instead be ingesting sugar and other carbohydrates, and you'll quickly feel hungry again. The sugar in your bloodstream requires the release of insulin to process it. The insulin tells the fat cells to open up and start sucking up all that sugar. When there an over-abundance the walls of your arteries get inflamed in the process, causing your body to *produce* cholesterol to attempt to heal the damage. Then you've got leftover insulin in the blood, and so you feel hungry again so you can put it to use.
Stop accepting what you've been told all your life. Stop eating sugar and stop avoiding fats. It's good for your brain and your heart, and you won't eat as much because you'll feel full for much longer.

A big part of the problem why Americans (and others) are fatter and fatter are because of misbeliefs foisted upon them.

Can't be voted up more enough. Let's say you buy some healthy low-fat yoghurt. And then you check and it's stuffed full with sugar! And it has a HUGE "low fat" printed on it, when it has more calories and is less healthy for you then the unmodified normal fat yoghurt. The problem is that your body _wants_ fat because that's what it has been designed to want for the last 100,000 years, and as long as it doesn't get the fat it wants it just wants more food!

This is why processed food ingredients need to be regulated. Individuals cannot be expected to all check every product for each food type - even more so if it's not properly labelled. Free enterprise has been allowed to pull dirty tricks such as the one you describe for too long.

A big part of the problem why Americans (and others) are fatter and fatter are because of misbeliefs foisted upon them.

Fatty foods don't cause heart disease. Sugar, stress, and smoking do. A high cholesterol count does not cause heart disease. It is a *symptom*, not a cause. It is your body attempting to repair the damage. Avoiding fats is a very good way to fatten yourself up. You'll instead be ingesting sugar and other carbohydrates, and you'll quickly feel hungry again. The sugar in your bloodstream requires the release of insulin to process it. The insulin tells the fat cells to open up and start sucking up all that sugar.

Reading tip: Why zebras don't get ulcers [amazon.com]. It explains really good how all this works, and what bad food and stress does to your body.

You forget about two things though! First is alcohol - although in a sense that can be counted as sugar as well. But not really! It should be mentioned along with the others: Alcohol! Second is cancer! Too much food, smoking and alcohol cause cancer. Stress does not cause cancer, but it has a very big negative impact on it once you get it.

You don't have evidence. You're just too ignorant to know what is and is not evidence. You don't know how to structure data to use it properly. You don't know how to read statistics. You don't know how to use statistics.

Actually the US has just about the best prenatal care in the world. Its a product amongst other things of the right to life people that strive against abortions etc... and as a result we have the best technology and medical care for threatened infants.

As to the assumptions on the statistics... those are without basis and are merely someone's guess.

You are ignoring the core point which is that the statistics are not directly comparable.

Right, because the English and Germans don't have TV dinners or unhealthy foods.

I said cultural exports. The TV dinners the British and Germans have were invented by Americans, and the culture pushed around the world. As always the evidence is on my side.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T... [wikipedia.org]

Traditional English food is what?

Roast beef, Yorkshire Pudding and vegetables on a Sunday. Fish on a Friday. Stew. Can't answer for Germans.

Now after citing that, tell me how that's oh so much more healthy then anything else.

Seriously... the whole thing exists almost entirely in the media and no where else.

Can you find land whales if you look for them? Sure... so what? That proves nothing.

This is as bogus as the "Americans don't know history/geography" line which is only true in that they don't know EUROPEAN history or geography as well as europeans. But by the same token, europeans don't know american history or american geography.

I've quizzed them on it repeatedly and they know nothing beyond what you'd get

As an American, you sound like a stupid American. It is precisely this incurious attitude. This willingness to swallow anything without consideration so long as it appears popular that is so reprehensible.

Either have a mind of your own or surrender any claim to one and with that any right to an opinion what so ever.

American history didn't start in the 1940s, fool. US history goes back to 1776, European American history goes back to 1492, and Native American history goes back tens of thousands of years.

All your pathetic argument is trying to do now is say that european history is more important. And therefore someone ignorant of American history is not ignorant while someone ignorant of European history is ignorant. This is merely euro centrism.

This ignores the point I made about the Japanese that are themselves not te

You used that argument to say American history was shallow and therefore ignorable. While European history was deeper and therefore of relevance. You are now modifying or augmenting your argument to say that history is infinite and that therefore American history is inferior because it tends to get very spotty prior to European colonization. This ignores the fact that European history is likewise spotty in all portions where histories were not well recorded. We know m

Contradiction is not an argument. You've long ago stopped defending your arguments and have since gone into simple contradiction. What is more, not only do you simply contradict me... responding "no it isn't" every time I say "yes it is"... but you've apparently confused yourself and are now contradicting yourself.

You're done. You'll likely keep sputtering after this point but I won't let you waste more of my time with your obvious stupidity.

Would you accept my anecdote that found the two to be generally equivilent if you exempted statistical abnormalities?

There are portions of the US that do have a lot of fat people. However, not all portions of the US have lots of fat people. Go to Los Angeles for example where I live and you don't see much of it. Go to most rural communities and you also tend not to see it. Most of the fat asses exist in the mid west... and there are some further demographic break downs from there that shed further light on

You're presenting the mid west as if it's the abnormal outlier. In reality Los Angeles is the outlier. Due to the influence of the movie industry, the body beautiful is more of an obsession there than most other places in the world. Whether it's achieved by genuine healthy living or fad diets, gym obsession, drugs or plastic surgery.

This is why anecdotes and gut-feel count for nothing next to data. You;'e overly biased towards thinking that your experiences are typical.

Actually, from this [youtube.com] part of the video, it looks like two slats converge under the front and rear wheels. This would also be suitable for lifting three-wheeled cars (mentioned in a comment below).

I love how the first reaction is to come up with a disadvantage that affects 0.01% of the population. Simple solution: cars that don't have 4 wheels can't be parked by the robot and they'll send you to the regular lot.

At the bottom of the article is a linked video [vimeo.com] to the robot manufacturer. The robots do indeed lift the cars by the wheels. This video is much more interesting than the animated one from the article.

From the picture it looks like it takes just as much space as a regular parking garage, but I think the real potential in a system like this is in maximizing the density of parked cars. I'm picturing something like an Amazon warehouse, but with cars on each shelf. In places where space is at a premium, this sort of ultra-dense shelving system seems like the right way to store a lot of cars. What would also be awesome would be a smartphone app that gives the garage a heads up 5 minutes before you arrive to p

I'm picturing something like an Amazon warehouse, but with cars on each shelf.

Those kinds [franky242.net] of shelf parking systems [blogspot.com] already exist, however, they require building an entirely new parking structure [realitypod.com]. The robot "valets" work with existing structures, which means a parking operator can upgrade just for the price of a few robots plus the check-in station, rather than having to tear down and rebuild from scratch. The operator can als

I know we all like to look smart and clever, but I'm starting to think we should just let those comments go unanswered. You're just encouraging ignorance like the above when you coddle it. Instead, stop encouraging the willfully ignorant, let them go find their home at Fox News where they belong.

By the time I trust a robot to suck my dick, it'll probably have a direct neural interface. I just keep thinking about the feeding robot arm mashing the head model in the face. I don't want anything pounding my balls like that.

The basic idea has been around for a while now, in a number of countries besides Germany. And it has less to do with laziness or luxury, and more to do with maximizing the use of valuable space in areas of high urban density. The only thing that appears to be novel here is the use of a free-moving robot rather than a conveyance that is incorporated into the parking structure itself. Granted, there are other benefits as well--being able to retrieve your car rapidly and efficiently reduces parking structure congestion and environmental pollution from excessive idling.

It's a neat application, but I'm not sure that it's what most of us would think of as a "robot".

Then most of you are idiots, and you should go hang out on the gawker network or similar instead of infesting Slashdot. This is clearly a robot. Maybe it's not a sexy humanoid robot that will suck you off every morning, but it's clearly a robot.

It's also clearly a product with limited utility, because how long is it going to be before cars are all self-driving? The cars will park themselves in the same sort of garages we have now, but they'll surrender to garage control upon arrival. You'll park in the vale

Is it me or does anybody see a problem with this? in that unless you can fork lift the car from in front or behind you need to leave a large amount of space between each car to get the robot in. Which reduces your carpark capacity.
Councils in the UK make new carparks with tiny spaces where you have to literally climb out this is done to maximise revenue.

No more humans working as parking valets! The trend continues. Make note that agencies do not consider the availability of a trade just the fact that if the job were available the person is able to do it. Therefore you are not disabled even if every trade you can work in is eliminated by technology. You might be blind and confined to a wheelchair but by god you can still weave one heck of a buggy whip and therefore can not be classified as disabled even when no buggy whip factory exists. And being th